Refreshing Publishing Magazine

The Refreshing Publishing imprint

The Refreshing Publishing imprint is a custom publishing imprint that creates and self-publishes educational eBooks and magazines. The Refreshing Publishing magazine is an example of one such publishing project that has recently started. There are other eBook and eLearning projects that are underway that will be published under the Refreshing Publishing imprint in the near future.

The Refreshing Publishing magazine

In early 2025, the Refreshing Publishing Magazine is being launched as part of the Refreshing Publishing imprint. An amalgamation and expansion of the previous Refreshing Publishing Guides that came out in April 2024, RPM issue 1 will start with digital accessibility, a subject that is (and should be) at the heart of digital learning design. This coincides with my talk at IATEFL 2025 in Edinburgh: Including protected characteristics in ELT alternative text image characteristics.

IATEFL 2024: Accessibility in digital ELT content development

The following image is a sketch note of my IATEFL presentation produced by Emily Bryson. She has highlighted the key points made in my talk, all of which can be found in Issue 1 of my Refreshing Publishing Magazine.

Infographic showing information from the presentation on accessibility in digital ELT content development. 1 in 5 (87 million) Europeans have a disability. According to the UK Government, out of 1,000 people, 77% have vision issues, 18% have hearing issues, 10% have dyslexia and 8% of men and 1% of women have colour vision issues. One way to make your content more accessible is to add alternative text descriptions to images, using the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. Alt text best practice first asks, do you need the alt text? Consider if the image is decorative or for meaning. If using in assessment, will the description give away the answer. Don't write 'image of' or 'photo of'. Use proper grammar and punctuation. Use plain language and avoid jargon. Make the description as short as possible. Either use an image caption or the alt text description field.